What's On My Mind
by loki-laufeyson-of-asgard
Summary: Six months later, Tyler comes back.


**A/N: ****I haven't posted on this site in six years, but have decided to start doing it again mostly for my shorter stories which I know won't get much attention on ao3. All my fic can also be found on my tumblr, astralhux. **

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"Next," I say.

Two for _Jack's Fucked Up Decision,_ says a very familiar voice.

I look up through the Plexiglas barrier. "You," I snarl.

He grins at me. He looks better than he should. His hair has grown back out and he's wearing the old leather jacket and an NIN shirt. The hole at the back of his skull has disappeared.

Me, he says.

There is someone behind him squinting at the marquee. "Um," he starts, "I'd like—"

"Excuse us," I say, holding up one hand, and then, to Tyler: "You can't be here."

I'm here because you're here.

"That isn't—" I pinch the bridge of my nose. I tongue the inside of my cheek where the bullet hole is still scarring over. It hurts like a tumor I once would've named _Marla. _"That's not how it works."

Oh? His smile is crooked. Why don't you tell me how it works then, Psycho Boy?

"Sir," says the man behind Tyler, "can I—"

"Just _hold on," _I spit at him. "Look," I say to Tyler, "I shot you. You're dead."

He holds out his arms. And yet—

I close my eyes. When I open them he's still there. He's watching me and I notice—because I'm looking for it—that he doesn't have a reflection.

"Why did you come back," I ask.

He shrugs. I was bored. You're bored. He puts his hand on the divider. Let's go do something.

"I'm not interested."

I'll let you throw the first punch.

"Tyler—"

I'm gonna wait, he says, exactly three minutes behind the theater for you. Then I blink, and he's gone. The guy behind him is staring at me; there's the shadow of a yellowing bruise under his left eye, and he starts:

"Wait, aren't you—"

I wrench off my nametag. "Excuse me," I say, and put up the _CLOSED _sign before bolting.

Tyler's in the back parking lot, kicking stones and broken beer bottles around the curb. He grins when he sees me coming, holds up one hand. Hey, he says.

I grab his collar and shove him back against the brick wall. "You," I say, so furious I can hardly see, shaking, "_cannot be here."_

He rolls his eyes. He's still grinning a little, watching me, watching my hands. Say it one more time, you might actually start meaning it.

"I'm working again," I say. "Six _months, _Tyler. You can't just—" I take a breath. "You can't just show up like this."

Yeah, he says, eyes dropping from my hands to my clothes, my theater uniform, red vest, white shirt, I can see why you'd be embarrassed, corporate sellout—

His jaw cracks when I hit him. He stumbles, but I don't lose my grip on his jacket. My knuckles are stinging from the punch and he groans, reaching up, rubbing his skin. God, he says. You asshole. Then he hits me, and I do lose my grip, starbursts exploding beneath my eye.

There isn't anyone back here, and I don't feel weird about busting his lip open. He hits my nose and it's like I've slammed my face into concrete. I punch his stomach. He grabs me by the collar. Throws me to the ground. We land blow after blow on the curb, until I feel the glass of the bottles in my hair. He aims a kick at my ribs while I'm trying to pick them out, and then he's on his knees, grabbing my collar, slamming me down onto the hard cement, yelling:

You can't shut me out. You can't keep me away. I'll always come back, do you hear me? I'll always be here.

I twist my head to the side and spit out blood. I think I feel another tooth loose.

"Yeah?" I say. "I was here first, Tyler."

He snorts. He's still leaning over me. The busted place on his lip is shiny with his blood. You were nothing, he says. You had _nothing. _He gestures around me, the scant few cars in the back lot, the gray sky, the glass, my twisted up uniform. Oh, how the mighty have fallen—

I hit him again. "Shut up."

He wipes the blood from his mouth. I'm expecting another blow, but he just kneels there, over me, studying me. His eyes keep flicking restlessly over my face and finally he says, Okay.

"Okay? What's okay—"

He kisses me.

It tastes very familiar. I can feel the sting in his lower lip.

"What," I say, when he pulls back. I struggle to sit up, and he lets me. We're sitting caging each other in by our knees. He looks wary, but there's also that amused twist to the side of his mouth. I don't like realizing how much I've missed it.

What, he parrots. It's a natural turn of events.

I am Jack's confusion.

"Natural turn of—"

You're bored, he says. I'm bored. This was inevitable long before you shot me with my own gun.

"Actually," I say, but he holds up one hand:

And you aren't fulfilled, he says.

"Oh, and I suppose that fucking my hallucination is supposed to make me fulfilled?"

He grins with the side of his mouth. It'll fill something, he says.

I laugh. I can't help it.

You want this, he says. It doesn't sound like a question, but it is. I know this because Tyler knows this.

"All right," I say. "All right."

I kiss him back. I bite his lip. It stings in my own mouth.

I am Tyler's smug sense of victory.


End file.
